


cynosure

by lipgloss



Category: UNIQ (Band)
Genre: Adopted-Sibling Incest, Coming of Age, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-11
Updated: 2015-08-11
Packaged: 2018-04-14 04:28:57
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,959
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4550460
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lipgloss/pseuds/lipgloss
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>where yibo learns to speak his heart and chengyan tries to amend things</p>
            </blockquote>





	cynosure

**Author's Note:**

> to [gel](http://www.twitter.com/yibotv) and i'm sorry this took so long.  
>  **warning** incest between adopted siblings and slight mature content.
> 
> cynosure (ˈsīnəˌSHo͝or) - the centre of admiration

They first met when Yibo was seven – stubborn and childish.

 

Māmā was ecstatic at the prospect of having another son.

“He has the same birthday as Yibo! It’s like they are twins already,” she cooed albeit the boy is a year older than Yibo and unlikely to be one.

They showed her a picture of him afterward and Yibo watched in all of his helplessness as she fell in love with the boy with soiled shirt, crescent eyes and candid smile as quick as the twinkle in her own. As if he wasn’t enough, Yibo thought petulantly, his jealousy coiling inside him like wild wisteria choking its host off every essence.

Her penning bleed black on the paper and that was it, a legal agreement and a finality. There will be a new company for them but Yibo cannot find it in his heart to rejoice so he sulked instead until Māmā sent him to his room that night without any supper.

He was not hungry anyway when there is this question in the back of his head, eating at him inside out – _will she send Yibo away if the kid is better than him?_

The waiting was not long, ridiculously short even.

Yibo was at the front lawn; legs dangling over the porch, summer sun glaring on his back and his cherry popsicle melting into a runny mess. He struggled to save most of it, lapping at the treat diligently. His mouth and cheeks and hands were sticky with the sugary liquid when Māmā walked through the garden gate with a boy trailing behind her. His eyes were curious and timid, very much like a lost kitten and Yibo did nothing but frowned at this unwelcomed stranger until Māmā took Yibo in her arms, lifting him up to his feet.

He had an inkling, a strong one.

“That’s Chengyan and he’s going to be your new brother,” she announced and her velvety voice rings reality like thunder in Yibo’s ear, clouding him with electrifying anxiety. He intuitively looked away, his small hand fisting Māmā’s shirt as he fervently prayed with his tiny, tiny heart that this was not real. Nothing was real.

Māmā leaned closer instead when the silent had stretched long enough, whispering so this would be just her and Yibo’s very own secret. “Chengyan is just as fresh as spring isn’t it?”

Yibo bit back the honest argument of a child.

Chengyan is clearly not spring. He is a summer – overbearing and taking things away from Yibo far too quickly for his liking. Like how the sun did with his favourite popsicle.

But, he did not disagree.

If he is good enough, he can stay, right?

 

Everything came in pair now; clothing, bedding, toys and such, like twins.

Yibo did not mind these, he was always quick in choosing the one with the prettier colour and Chengyan will be left with no option after Māmā persuaded him with her patience and soft words. He learned over the time that he would not be sent away if he misbehaved but there was only the need to share things he did not want to share like Māmā’s attention and desserts and the right to choose bedtime stories.

They had grown significantly too although Chengyan always managed to top him with a few more centimetres. But, then, no matter how similar they were to each other in appearance, Yibo will always be the baby and incapable in others’ eyes and he hated it.

 

“I want my own cake.” Yibo mentioned one time, casual but earnest because he really did not want to share cakes and candles anymore. The traditional chocolate stopped becoming his favourite for a while now and there is this half of a candle Māmā put on the cake that always look so out of place – their average age she said.

“Why, darling?” Māmā peered over her poetry book. The three of them were relaxing under the sun with her boys racing each other to finish their homework, it was a bearable summer still and their legs are tangled over each other on the grass. “Is one cake not enough for you two?”

“The cake are enough,” Yibo nodded slowly before shrugging it off, “never mind.”

Chengyan suddenly piped in, unnecessary. “Yibo does not like chocolate anymore, Mā!”

Yibo fumed almost in an instant. He did not need Chengyan to take his words right from his own mouth. “I did not!”

“You did! I remember you’ve told me.”

“You’re lying.”

“I did not. You ar—“ Chengyan’s word halt midway when Yibo tackled him to the ground. The air knocked out of his lung in a quick swoosh and they fought like sibling do – with vehemence but short-lived.

It was the first strike, a small hole jarring them apart although they were already on different solitude.

 

\--

 

Five summer passed them in a blink ever since, but Chengyan stayed with his very own sun burning bright and charming. Easily, he won his way with people and as if he had been here the whole time instead of a newcomer, he fit nicely where Yibo still struggled to mesh his rough edges.

 

Their grades came a few weeks after the first blanket of snow covered Beijing. In two careful envelope stamped with the school’s emblem. Chengyan barely passed, he was exhilarated anyway, but Yibo had red-inked grades aligned in his report card and a recommendation letter for winter school program. His class teacher even wrote a footnote, insisting the importance of this winter school for Yibo and Māmā was convinced by her that she enrolled both of them.

Chengyan protested against it, whining over phone calls as verbal and upfront as ever. His voice was muffled but every word still bled at Yibo even when he hid himself under the cover, swallowing fresh wave of guilt every single night. He was aloof about it but the truth are coppery in his mouth, tangible and lingering.

He was never good enough, a nuisance, and Yibo stared at Chengyan’s drooped shoulder on their way to school during winter with leaded heart.

 

The classes were mundane, reversing topics that did not make sense in the first place and no one make any effort, mind and soul still stranded at the warmth of their own bed. They simply copied the notes on the board, took a quiz and quietly went back home so, when Māmā told him to invite his friends over after class, he spluttered his milk and refuse. There was no one to anyway.

Chengyan, however, was happy to brought back a senior from his drama class – his winter school program a lot more interesting than Yibo’s – and Māmā found Wenhan a good companion that they keep having him over. Both of them, Chengyan and Wenhan, were in sync most of the time. They shared a sense of humour – same eagerness and twinkle Māmā had fell in love before – and when they talked over the table Yibo was easily outnumbered. She entertained most of their shenanigans so they grew, in volume and closeness, until it naturally become Chengyan and Wenhan with Yibo.

“Chengyan, take Yibo along with you,” Yibo would heard Māmā called out and Chengyan sighed, loud and clear. Yibo might had shrunk a bit inside.

“I’m going out with Wenhan,” he whined at her but she steeled at his attempt.

“I know. Just let him play with you two,” she insisted and that was how Yibo kept finding himself staring at Chengyan’s shoulder lines, this time leaning in and shaking with laughter.

It was not even funny, Yibo grumbled under his breathe. Half of the thing Wenhan did is not, frankly speaking. He is just older and that somehow made him looked cool.

A white puff of air rolled out of Yibo’s mouth and he distract himself with watching the cloud unfurl before dissipating into transparency. In one way or another, Yibo felt connected, wanting to just turn invisible at this moment, and fascinate himself with more white clouds of warm breath until Chengyan snapped and told him to stop. From the side, Wenhan snorted with laughter and Yibo felt like knocking the teeth out of them.

 

 

Apparently, Yibo did not have to knock their teeth off – they already did with each other.

When Yibo was fifteen, Wenhan spend his Christmas’ Eve with them and no one questioned the intimacy of the situation, he already had a place of his own in their house and was very much welcomed. Yibo did not delved deeper, leaving Wenhan and Chengyan as they are until he woke up at three in the morning with empty room and parched throat only to stumble upon them at the kitchen.

Wenhan had his back pressed flat onto the refrigerator, hands stabling Chengyan by his waist who almost drowned Wenhan with his eagerness. Their lips curled knowingly at the edges with laughter that threatening to bubble out – very much radiant, very much lost in each other – and when they leaned in Yibo let out a yelp, an embarrassing high-pitched noise that startled the couple. They recoiled as quickly as Yibo who dashed out to the safety of their unlit porch.

There were footsteps thudding on the floor, Yibo could heard them through the still of the night and deafening rush of blood in his brain.

It was Wenhan and Chengyan, Yibo tried to convince himself. He recalled the image in his head and immensely regret his decision in a split of a second. The winter night was mercilessly cold and Yibo was only in his pyjamas. He brought his knees to his chin and fascinate himself with the puff of white cloud coming from his mouth.

He wanted to just disappear like them.

The door creaked and Yibo felt his skin jumped at the sound. He stiffen at the sudden warmth and only relaxed when it was just Chengyan wrapping a thermal blanket around him and taking a seat next to him. They shared the blanket because carrying two of these is a trouble feat. The air was heavier, colder and Yibo felt the need for oxygen, or breathing space, clawing in his lung but they remained silent next to each other.

“Where’s Wenhan ge?” Yibo started.

“Upstairs.” Another beat of silence before Chengyan continues, face scrunched in concern. “You won’t tell Māmā, right?”

“Tell her what?” Yibo quirked a quick brow at Chengyan, a tiny smile ghosting on his lips. “That you almost get down on her kitchen?”

“I did not!”

“If you insist,” Yibo hummed, “but we both know better.”

“Well, he’s a good kisser.”

“Like you’ve kissed a lot of people,” Yibo snuggled into the blanket when his nose began to hurt by the cold weather.

“But, it’s nice,” Chengyan sighed, “he’s nice.”

Yibo’s unamused expression shut Chengyan up and he giggled. Yibo held back the urge to push him off the porch because if he scooped the snow under his feet and held it to his heart, white would turn bloody red.

“It’s hard to keep it by myself.” Chengyan’s voice tore a little at the end. “I’m so, so happy, Yibo, but I can’t tell anyone.”

Yibo laid his head on the fold of his arms, turning on his left cheek so he would not have to see Chengyan. “What are you afraid of? It’s not like Māmā will disown you. She’s too soft-hearted to do that.”

“She won’t.” Chengyan smiled. “It’s Wenhan. You know how his parents are. That’s why he’s here in the first place anyway.”

Yibo snickered, cutting the conversation short and pushed himself up. “Just wait until you are legal if anything,” he said before leaving.

Chengyan followed him from behind and Yibo did nothing but frowned at the sight of Chengyan with the lost kitten look on him again. The hole was much bigger now, more noticeable. They were held together only by strands of similarities, a mesh over a wound.

When Yibo was fifteen, Beijing recorded the coldest winter in the history.

 

\--

 

Yibo’s seventeenth spring rolled in and their garden bloomed with colours and fragrance. He loved it – the way different scent create the serene ambience and remind him of Māmā – so he would leave his window rolled up while studying or playing games and occasionally glance at the slow bulb of orange blossom growing next to his and Chengyan’s bedroom. When the other flowers that Māmā tended had fully bloomed, orange blossom were always a few weeks late and like when Chengyan had bloomed, shoulders broader and fuller, Yibo is still wrapped in his own world and taking his time to become truly beautiful.

Wenhan was out of the picture for a year now, moving away to a different country after Chengyan’s graduation, following up his parent’s divorce. The distance did not worked well for Chengyan who needed to see Wenhan to be sure. They ended in a halt, too sudden and too numbing – and Chengyan healed himself with his passion for soccer and sneaking into Yibo’s bed whenever he wanted to be held. They never spoke of those nights, both of them are just there and feeding each other with undiscussed illusions.

After all, they were at the opposite spectrum of teenager’s social life.

 

“Where are you going?” Yibo spoke up, putting down his highlighter and World History’s notes on the bed. Chengyan stopped in his motion, back stooped low and one leg already dangling out of the window.

“Out,” Chengyan squirmed, his legs trying to find its hold on the tree branches. “I’m just going to be quick.”

“You need to fucking get your shit together.” Yibo disapproved and Chengyan laughed at the other boy’s distress.

“I’ll pick up some holy water on the way back. Your mouth need a wash.” Then, he was gone. His dyed hair, bobbing in the dark all the way down the street.

“Look who’s talking.” Yibo whispered to the quiet air before he returned to his notes as if his head was not filled with _is he doing drugs_ and _when will he be back_ in a million way of different phrasing.

 

Surprisingly, Chengyan was already back at two in the morning and that was early considering his previous record. Yibo was puzzled but, he still remembered to mess his hair and droop his eyelids like he had gone to sleep and not awake and worrying. He pushed the window open and helped pulled Chengyan up since he was incapable to do so on his own.

He was annoyed at something, Yibo noticed. His lips pressed into a thin line and when Yibo fell on his own bed, Chengyan did too, pulling Yibo close that his mouth were pressed onto Yibo’s brown locks.

“What happened?” Yibo tilted his head but the room was too dark and he could only trace the outline of Chengyan’s feature. It was tensed.

“They wanted you.” Chengyan’s voice was dangerously low, a grumble roughen by alcohol that Yibo sniffed from his breathe.

“Who wanted what?” Yibo reached down, playing with Chengyan’s finger around his waist. It was shaking and Yibo felt so overwhelmed with this foreign boy that he turned a little frantic inside.

“My teammates,” he stopped for a second, “they wanted to fuck you. Said that you look like a girl and they won’t even hesitate for a second.”

Yibo choked, his hands paralysed above Chengyan’s. “W-what did you say then?”

Out of a sudden Chengyan twisted Yibo to lay on his back and quickly pressed his lips on him, growling as he licked his way by turning Yibo’s inside into a heated glob of mess. Yibo did not struggle. His coherence collapsed at the first spark that burst blindingly at the back of his eyes because it was amazing, Chengyan was good and experienced, and it was not too because somehow he knew that Chengyan was violating him.

“Not going to let them to touch you,” Chengyan muttered when he pulled away. Leaning his forehead on Yibo’s collarbone, he breathed goose bump on Yibo’s skin and was quiet until he knocked out.

It was the alcohol, Yibo comforted himself. He stared at the ceiling blankly, his lips still tingled and there was a sharp tang of unknown liquor on his cottony tongue.

When both of them were awaken by the sunrise, Yibo was still a little out in his head and Chengyan suffered a hangover. Neither of them brought up what happened last night and Yibo never felt so used before. Their line remain as solid and parallel as ever with no intersection even in the near future; Chengyan with his rowdy crowd of teammates and moderate-sized fanbase of their city’s soccer team while Yibo was contented with humouring the Korean transferee who barrelled into his life with tilted mandarin, soft eyes and cheeky pranks.

 

“Yibooo,” Sungjoo basically butchered his name and Yibo rolled his eyes at the expense of the other. Sungjoo did not mind, dropping himself with a grin on the empty seat in front of Yibo’s desk and he keep staring until Yibo felt heat crept under his cheek.

“What do you want?”

“Let’s play basketball this evening.” He picked up Yibo’s notebook and twirled it on his finger. “I haven’t played for a long time.”

“Too bad.” Yibo deadpanned and continue to finish his work that was due today. “I’m practicing.”

“Come on. Your dance recital is in months,” Sungjoo whined. “Liao don’t like me. If I play on my own, he will kill me and make it look like accident.”

“Which I won’t object at all.”

Sungjoo huffed, poking the pen Yibo was holding so he would have to rewrite the same phrase again and again.

“Fine, fine!” Yibo chucked a pencil at Sungjoo and he grinned that his effort would not go to waste. “Let me finish my work now or I’ll purposely pay Liao to make it really look like accident.”

At Yibo’s agreement, Sungjoo whooped and left him as per requested. He began to flutter from one group to another in the class, his voice loud and his laughter even more so, and Yibo wondered at this, at the easy way Sungjoo carry himself.

What was so different about him than Chengyan then?

Probably sensing the other gaze on him, Sungjoo turned quickly and shot a smile in which Yibo scoffed mildly, quickly focused on solving his trigonometry again.

Sungjoo’s smile did not make his heart caught in his throat.

Sungjoo’s smile made Yibo want to punch the daylight out of him. That was the difference.

However, when Sungjoo stood at the departing gate with his luggage and crying, Yibo kissed him quiet although Chengyan was there behind him, eyes burning at the back of his head. He was not sure of it but, Sungjoo was safe at the very least.

 

When Chengyan drove him back home in a silent car ride, the orange blossom bulbs were littering their lawn.

Māmā had uprooted the tree when they were gone. ‘It was so sick already,’ she said and Yibo cried again, already feeling a little tender with Sungjoo’s departure.

It was unsettling. The view from his window is different now that the tree is not there. Yibo almost did not recognized them. By evening, the bulbs were dying, their pale petal wrapped tighter against them as if they were too afraid and just chose to slip away instead.

This time, the hole was too large that Yibo remained agape as he slipped and descend into a pitch black. He had ignored it and now when it was already cancerous inside his heart, Yibo collapsed weakly at its feet.

 

\--

 

At autumn, it was a period that passes like a paused frame, still and slow and cajoling.

Yibo did not reached out for Chengyan anymore and neither does he. Only Māmā’s weekly phonecall that kept them updated with each other when Yibo is flying all over the world; learning, creating, teaching and perfecting his dance, perfectly happy to forget useless trigonometry and eager to know more about himself and his limit.

“ _Chengyan have new names, he is playing in Brazil now_.”

She ranted with pride, although her knowledge on soccer were close to nothing, because both of them are her children and they are trying to be an even better man and that was rewarding enough for her. Yibo did not mind listening to this because he knew that she spoke of him to Chengyan and the other would have to listen to her too.

At autumn, the strands holding them remained in a staccato.

 

\--

 

Even with the grander scheme and finer things in life, Yibo misses home terribly.

It is an embarrassing thing to admit when Yibo is twenty-two and at the peak of his career. But, he did and they let him take a break in between the tour before Milan happen. Impulsively, he booked a one-way ticket to Beijing and packed lightly, it is summer there if he recalls thing well and his flight to Milan will be handled by his tour team later in two weeks’ time.

He did not expect to see Chengyan, all sharp lines and long, defined limbs to be there at home. Looking very much tanned and grown up and well in the living room that screams of their childhood. Yibo might have turned around and made the taxi driver to take him back to the airport but Māmā is glassy-eyed and soft with greying hair and a smile that crinkled the edge of her eyes. She take him into her arm, not able to lift him to his feet anymore but still very, very warm. Yibo hates himself that he even thought of turning his back to this just a second ago when he really, really missed this.

 

Yibo forgets that he still shares a bedroom with Chengyan until it is midnight and jetlag setting weight on his eyelids.

He had stayed at the table after dinner, Māmā listening his story of countries he visited, people he had taught and things he had seen until he begins to swallow his yawns with the back of his hand. She cupped his face in her nimble hands, the wrinkles and greenish vein more prominent with her age, before kissing him good night as if Yibo is nine all over again and accidentally watched a horror movie Chengyan had turned to on their cable television.

It is not until he has twisted the knob, Chengyan’s voice filtered through the crack that he remembered and know he is fucked.

The echoing creak stops Chengyan’s singing and Yibo runs through his impressive cursing vocabulary in all the seven languages he picked up. A hand – not his, for sure – opens the door wider and he prays to all the deity and his deceased ancestor to save him from this kind of torture but well, it did not happen.

“I changed your sheet,” Chengyan says before retreating to his bed. Yibo takes this chance, Chengyan with his back on him, to leap to his bed on his front.

He quickly shut his eyes, using every fibre of willpower in him to ignore the need to wash himself.

 

Yibo ends up spending a lot of his time at their lawn under the new tree Māmā had planted in replace of the orange blossom before. He mindfully notes in his head to ask for the name of this tree later as he hums a song, his mind flowing at ease into a spontaneous choreography. He replayed the image over and over again, testing and perfecting it in his head so he could materialize it later when he is back in his practice room again. It was amazing how easy it is for Yibo right now when he is relaxed and happy to come up with anything after months of blank static and exhausting flight schedule.

“Yibo,” a voice called out and he shoots up, scrapping his elbow on the ground in the process.

He yearns to reach out and kiss him senseless but he distaste the approaching presence at the same time when all kind of hurt is refuelling in him. Before the voice can come any closer, Yibo dashes out of the lawn to the neighbourhood road and scales his way aimlessly. Taking in as much nostalgia as he could, greeting passer-by who he recognized but fails to recall.

A lot of things changed and Yibo wondered if he did too or did he remain the same.

Turning left at the three-way junction, Yibo is suddenly hit by a wave of familiarity. This is the back road he and Chengyan used to take to school, even that one winter before, and he is pulled to walk down all the way until the fading brick building greeted his view. From the corner of his eyes, Yibo caught a flash of movement that tugs a little too hard in him and he turns sharply to his right, catching the figure on time.

Li Wenhan.

Yibo lets out a laugh, slightly sadistic and broken. Of course, it has to be Wenhan. He is even more stunning now, that same eyes twinkling with a galaxy or two in his irises as he walks straight into the gate of their school.

That justify why Chengyan is here and not in Brazil.

 

It was like a rabbit chase.

Yibo keeping Chengyan at least a good two metre radius away from him and he is painfully obvious about it too, Māmā laughing every time Yibo disappear into thin air whenever Chengyan enters the same room as he is.

But, Māmā is out for some grocery shopping today – Yibo is cornered and Chengyan just exploded three seconds ago.

“Why do you keep running away?” Chengyan is blocking the kitchen’s entry and at the stare Yibo is giving him, he braces himself and quickly adds, “You’ve always been running away. What happened to us?”

Yibo levels himself with the other man, his eyes lit with a cold fire because he had enough too. “What is us, Chengyan?”

The question hangs heavily in the air, something ancient and ugly and Chengyan is stunned at the confrontation. Yibo continues at the other’s silence. “You’re always so,” he breathes harshly out of his mouth, “so, so tactless. So insensitive. We can’t always go your way.”

“I didn’t even know what I did wrong, you’re just so far away one day. What am I supposed to do?”

“I don’t know!!” Yibo screamed and like a rabbit in a trap, he bled. “I’m seventeen. I didn’t know then, or even now, because you’re just so you and I don’t know.”

Yibo moves away, palms flat on the counter surface to stable himself. He is a dancer but right now he is so out of balance, it is ironic. His eyes is glued to the polished marble but Chengyan had his on him, still waiting, more patient than he had ever been before.

“Wenhan is back, isn’t?” Yibo spats. Wanting to hurt Chengyan too because he was so calm and Yibo is nothing but a wreck right now.

“Yeah, he did. Three months ago.” Chengyan is late to catch the underlying venom beneath but when he did, he sputters, faux-scandalized. “We did not, Yibo, what — this is ridiculous.”

Chengyan pulls his hair back in frustration, turning around and walk the steam off at the living room before he returns in front of Yibo. He is always so extra, Yibo muses for a second before snapping himself back to reality.

“It must be that kiss,” he suddenly come into a realization. “Damn it. I really, really wanted you.”

Yibo recoils back. “Like your friends?”

“No.” He looks faux-scandalized once again. “More,” he whispers, “much more than that.”

“No, no, no.” Yibo slides down to the floor, covering his ears. He does not want to hear this now, not when he is going away and not when he had waited for so, so long to hear such words. “You can’t do this.”

“I can,” he looks smug and Yibo felt like ripping Chengyan because there it was his old tactless self. But, his thought come into a crash when Chengyan looks downward at him with crescent eyes and dazzling smile and earnest promise of, “I can be better. We can be better this time.”

“Can we?” Yibo scoffs, slightly unconvinced and shuts his eyes, wishing he was just a cloud of warm air on winter all over again.

Chengyan sighs, a ruffle and Yibo can sense heat radiating on his left. He is probably crouching next to him. “Can I just show you instead?”

A drop of pin would have ruined the moment and Yibo pulls himself together. Even if Chengyan fails to convince him now, Yibo gambles it all, pulling him close by his collar and kisses him instead this time. Upon the the slightest touch, he might have cried inside because this is so, so different and it was infinitely sweeter when he can really taste Chengyan, pure and true and so pliant to him. This time around, his small hands soft on Yibo, letting Yibo take some from him and give part of his own. Unlike the time when Chengyan was the only taking and Yibo is too quiet to resist and only gave.

They pulls away.

“Yeah,” Yibo’s voice is shaking, his hands too and everything even up in his heart.

“Better,” Chengyan leans, his forehead pressed on Yibo’s collarbone and running his lips on the skin fleetingly. Yibo relaxes, one hand tangling in Chengyan’s hair and Chengyan looks up to him, his eyes so sure. “We can be better.”

Slowly, Chengyan reaches down at Yibo’s free hand and intertwines their finger in a solid promise.

 

\--

**Author's Note:**

> thank you for reading. hit me up at twitter [@littleanonnie](http://www.twitter.com/littleanonnie) and guess who is Māmā.


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